Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 31, 1994 TAG: 9403310284
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: KATHY LOAN and STEPHEN FOSTER STAFF WRITERS
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Long
Last week, three finalists from 140 applicants went through rigorous, daylong interviews - their final chance to sell themselves to Blacksburg.
Town Manager Ron Secrist said Wednesday he hasn't made his decision yet. He plans to speak with citizens, law enforcement personnel, town department heads and others who met with the candidates before making a hire in April.
"They came in contact with a lot of people" during their time in town, Secrist said. Now it's up to him to pick a new chief, one that presumably will lead the town into the 21st century.
"This probably will be a decade decision," Secrist said.
\ Charles Bennett
It would be easy to pigeonhole Maj. Charles Bennett's career into one date: Dec. 18, 1984. That was the day Bennett was shot saving a 2-year-old girl from the clutches of a drugged-out abductor.
Bennett and other members of the Richmond Police Department's Special Weapons and Tactics Team had stormed an apartment building after the gunman set it on fire and threatened to throw the girl into the flames.
``It was about as worst-case a scenario as you can get,'' recalled Bennett, who established Richmond's SWAT team in 1973 and served as its commander for 12 years. Inside the smoke-filled apartment, Bennett took the girl from the gunman, and was shot as his body armor rose up and exposed his stomach. Another officer shot and killed the gunman.
Bennett spent more than a month in the hospital recovering. For his rescue, the then-captain received an Award of Valor from the Virginia Association of Chiefs of Police and was named one of Parade Magazine's 10 police officers of the year.
Bennett is not afraid to speak of accomplishment but is certain not to be caught tooting his own horn.
``Getting shot was a pretty big event,'' Bennett said. ``You want to avoid that.''
In an interview, he knows the area's catchwords: ``smart road, electronic village, Interstate 73.''
He says he sees Blacksburg as an efficiently run town with a good crime-fighting department. It is a community that doesn't have Richmond's problems, but deals well with the ones it has.
He sees the town as still somewhat innocent, and speaks of the need to be "diligent" and "vigilant" in thwarting the problems of violence and drugs.
Working with Virginia Tech Police would be ``a very easy, natural relationship,'' he says, and points to interaction with Virginia Commonwealth University police and students.
The 26-year veteran says he would lead by example.
``Management is important, but leadership is critical. Any police chief has to be a leader. To be a leader I've got to be a model. You've got to live the things you say."
At the same time, "you've got to involve people in the decision-making process," he says, speaking of both officers and the community at large. "People support what they help create."
Bennett, an award-winning chili chef, tends to expound on his adventure-related hobbies such as mountaineering, sea kayaking, and ice climbing.
In the seven months he's been hunting for a police chief's job, he's been a finalist for three positions and he turned down one offer.
``I do bring an awful lot of experience and education to [Blacksburg],'' he says. ``In 26 years I've gained a lot of skills that could be useful.''
But to be hired, he says, ``the fit has to be right - that's up to the people here to determine.''
\ William "Bill" Brown
Bill Brown has spent the past three months doing the job he wants permanently. Brown, 46, has been acting chief of the Blacksburg Police Department since January, when Chief Don Carey left for Missouri.
But there are few signs that Brown, captain of the Police Operations Division since 1986, has become comfortable in Carey's office. Someone suggested he hang a few certificates to give the office his own personal touch. But Brown says the less you move in, the less you have to move out.
"I'm just really having fun," he said last week.
Brown, a Vietnam veteran, was hired by the Blacksburg Police in 1970, the first black officer in the New River Valley. He was promoted to corporal three years later.
The discrimination of the 1960s was not far removed from Blacksburg in the early 1970s. People threatened him, Brown said. And when responding to a call, it wasn't uncommon to hear remarks such as: "My God, these niggers are taking over," Brown said.
But Brown said his even temperament allowed him to handle those situations.
Being a good leader, too, means you "don't let problems fester" by creating invisible barriers that keep the public and officers from sharing their concerns, Brown said.
Brown has had calls from supporters wishing him well in his bid to become chief of a department whose policies he has helped shape over the years.
He has made a few minor changes in the department. A committee looked into the need to revamp equipment and decided to order a new style of hat and to begin painting new police cars with a new stripe design. Brown said the two projects will make it easier for citizens to distinguish a Blacksburg officer from members of other nearby departments who have similar uniforms or cruisers.
If officers have a say in what type hat they wear or their cruisers, perhaps it will have a spillover effect to other parts of the job, he said.
"When officers feel good, feel part of the organization, they're happy. They want to come to work," Brown said.
Brown, who has an associate's degree from New River Community College in police science, believes his experience and educational background is appropriate for Blacksburg's melting pot community of blue collar workers, students and professionals.
He can relate to those with grade-school educations or doctoral degrees, he said.
He believes in training new officers to take the extra time necessary to make citizens feel they're being served.
Brown remembers Capt. Raymond Willard, who died recently, who was able to arrest people and have them thank him for it, Brown said.
"I learned patience from him," Brown said.
In his spare time, Brown relaxes in McCoy on a minifarm he owns with his brother, leaving the troubles of the day behind.
But he's always in touch through his beeper, so much a part of him that it's "like a tumor on you."
\ Hines Smith
Hines Smith, 49, had done his homework on Blacksburg. The Bellevue, Neb., police chief likes what he sees.
Smith hopes to return east to be closer to family in North Carolina. And if he becomes the town's next police chief, he would like it to be his last job before retiring here.
He entered law enforcement in 1966 after a stint in the Air Force, joining the High Point, N.C., police force for only $399 a month.
With police work, "there are no two days alike and that's what I love about it," Smith said.
He left High Point in 1981 to become an assistant chief in Garden City, Kan. In 1986, he became chief of police in Bellevue, a city that abuts Omaha and has a population of about 40,000.
He sees similarities between Blacksburg and Bellevue. Bellevue gets a spillover student population from the University of Nebraska-Omaha and experiences problems that occur when longtime residents and students mix.
And Smith is familiar with the national accreditation process Blacksburg Police recently completed. His department plans to enter the program this fall.
Smith believes a police organization is no different than any other business. "A police officer only spends about 3 percent of his time putting bad guys in jail," he said. Because police spend most of their time being community servants, they must exhibit a professional manner and be responsive to "customer" needs.
"I consider myself a very open, participatory-type chief," Smith said. If selected as Blacksburg's chief, there is no reason that the established delegation of authority should not continue, he said.
Smith is upfront about his suspension from the Bellevue chief position in 1992 after he cashed a $1,000 check to a nonprofit organization that raised money for a Drug Abuse Resistance Education program he had founded. He was found innocent by a jury that deliberated for 18 minutes.
Smith said he had cashed the check for 10 $100 bills, which he thought would have a greater impact than presenting a paper check at the group's next meeting. He put the money in a desk drawer and forgot about it until someone asked why the donor hadn't received a thank-you letter.
When Smith gave the money to his DARE officer to deposit, $300 was missing. Smith said he found and deposited the money later that day. It apparently had fallen behind a desk drawer along with some other paperwork. Being prosecuted and suspended was agonizing for the career lawman. He lost 30 pounds and his wife had a heart attack, Smith said, as he took off his glasses and tried to push back, then wipe away, tears.
"In my heart, I knew what I had done and what I had not done," Smith said. He would not jeopardize his career and $63,000 annual salary for $300, he said.
The experience has made him a better person, police officer and chief, Smith said. "One thing that it taught me was, if that can happen to me, it can happen to anyone."
Mere suspicion is not enough to charge someone, he said. "After what I went through, I would rather see 500 guilty people go free, than to see one innocent person" unjustly accused and falsely convicted, Smith said.
But Smith said that doesn't mean he avoids disciplinary actions when necessary against officers. It just has made him more compassionate about the effect that action has on an officer and family.
by CNB